Superwall weekly product and founder stories newsletter

Hey [First name] [First name], Jordan from Superwall here 👋 This week, Joseph talked to George, a non-technical founder running three apps at almost $41K MRR. Their topics? Why his roughest ad is the one making the most money. Plus, Android 2.8.5 has some fixes and tweaks, the paywall editor can now make your App Store review screenshot for you, and some news over where you can find us the next few weeks. Here's what you need to know: 🎬 The ad making money is a plain screen recording First up, Joseph talked to George, who runs three apps: Wrestle AI, a boxing app called Brawler and a fitness app. Together they're at almost $41K MRR, with $84K in total revenue over the last 28 days. And George isn't technical. A year ago he saw an ad for an AI app builder, figured it was BS, and then built a martial arts app for himself anyway. Fast forward to now, and he's got three apps making money through paid ads. His rule for all of it is clarity. If an ad clearly shows what the app does, a good product mostly sells itself. That same idea shows up in the app, too. On the third open, one of his apps, Brawler, asks if you want to talk to a founder. From those calls, he showed people features that he spent weeks building that hadn't been found. So now, a more-involved feature plays a short demo video the first time you tap it. He also doesn't judge every dollar on day-one return. He paid one boxing creator $4,500 for three videos, hoping to get a quarter to half of it back, just so boxers would see someone they trust using the app before his ads reached them. On that one, he got back 75%. 🎬 Watch it here 🛠️ Android 2.8.5 fixes worth upgrading for Next up, Android 2.8.5 is out: No more surprise refunds: Purchases that finish outside the normal purchase flow now get acknowledged, so Google Play doesn't refund them. That covers pending purchases, the app getting killed mid-purchase and Play Store promo codes. This was, in fact, not a feature 😅. Bug squashed, though! Subscribers stay active: Paying subscribers no longer show as inactive when Google Play doesn't answer at launch, or when a product loses its entitlement mapping. register() can't stall: A dropped product query at launch now retries when billing reconnects, instead of leaving that placement and every one after it stuck. Paywalls that can't load now close with the webViewFailedToLoad reason, matching iOS, instead of staying on screen. 📸 Your App Store review screenshot, made for you The tiniest paper cut of iOS development is no more! If you've ever had to make a review screenshot for a subscription in App Store Connect, the paywall editor can do it now. This has always been required for App Review to approve new subscriptions, in-app purchases, etc. Click the download button next to Share and you get a 1290 x 2796 PNG of your paywall, ready to upload without resizing. One heads-up: it's taken from the published version of your paywall, so save or publish your latest changes first. Example below from my own app: 📖 Read the App Store Screenshot guide 📆 Office Hours, App Week and a Berlin dinner Join Superwall Office Hours this Thursday, October 15, 12-1 PM ET. Bring your paywall, pricing questions, or that A/B test you can't quite call. Come hang out with Nick, Duncan and me. New York App Week is next week, too. Spirits Night on Monday, October 19 is still taking requests. The Growth Session and both founders dinners on Tuesday are full, but you can still join the waitlists. And we're hosting an App Founders Dinner with Phiture in Berlin on Wednesday, November 11, during Business of Apps. One table of founders, CEOs and growth leaders running subscription apps. It's approval-only, so request your seat early. ❤️ Superlove Finally, Carlos from Reset has started using Superwall for event tracking with our nascent MMP feature: Thanks for the love, Carlos 🫡 That's all for this week! As always, feel free to reply back and I'll be happy to help! - Jordan